by Steven Adler
First I was put in a police station in a small town in L.A. County called Laverne. Christian Slater had been sent there for some legal trouble just a few months before. It wasn’t that bad at all; I had a cell phone and cable TV and was assigned to washing police squad cars. I shared the cell with three other people and was locked up from eleven p.m. to six a.m. I’d be sleeping during that time anyway, so it really was a free ride. But back at the condo Lindsay was having a terrible time.
My brother Jamie was making life hell for her. Over the past few years, Jamie had become increasingly difficult. Maybe he felt he had my best interests in mind, but sometimes he would cross the line. I had no problem with Lindsay staying at the condo while I was incarcerated, but Jamie sure did. He would swing by every day and harass her. She was driving my Bronco around and Jamie called the cops reporting to them that she had stolen it. They pulled her over and handcuffed her, then discovered that she was living with me and that everything was okay. But Jamie was relentless in his attacks, forcing Lindsay to move in with a neighbor a few floors up.
On the weekends I was allowed visitors. You could go to a nearby park or the local library. Lindsay would bring me grub from Taco Bell or some other fast food I would be craving. Then I would bone her in the truck or we’d do it in some public bathroom. While I was back in the cell, I had a great idea. I called Lindsay and had her make a dental appointment for me (which was permitted) so I could get out for a while.
She picked me up at the jail and we went back to the condo. I scored some heroin and smoked it all afternoon. Soon it became night. I returned to the jail, but hours too late. It never takes anyone that long to go to the dentist. I was such a jackass.
Understandably, they wanted me to piss for them. But I was so high I couldn’t even pee. I couldn’t get a drop in the cup, and that was evidence enough for them that I was fucked up. They locked me up and the next morning a guard came and got me. I was put in the cell at the courthouse for eight hours. Then they placed me on the bus with all of the other inmates du jour and took us to the L.A. county jail. It was twenty-four hours later before I could lie down and sleep. Boy, I fucked up. This was the real deal, not the cushy arrangement I had before.
For some reason they asked me if I had ever seen a psychiatrist. I figured if I said yes they’d leave me alone, but if I said no I was in for hours of shrinkage. If anyone was ever preshrunk, it was me, so I said, “Oh yeah, all the time, ever since I was a kid.” It was kind of the truth. Whether it was nosy school guidance counselors or the resident quacks they had at rehab facilities, I was always getting analyzed whether I wanted to be or not.
Well, I ended up being placed with all the crazy people who had the luxury of receiving medication three times a day. All you did was sit around on the cement floor. If you were lucky you could sit on a bench. On each floor were three pods, each holding about thirty people. The walls were transparent Plexiglas. It was my first time in a real jail.
I would get letters from Debbie. She pretended as though nothing ever happened, like she had never fucked me over. My God, she was a complete and utter psycho.
Earlier, when I spotted her going into court, I pleaded with her, “Tell them I didn’t do what you said. What is wrong with you? You are ruining my life.” The only thing that kept me going was dreaming about how much I was going to party when I got out. I had to serve the entire ninety days. It seemed like forever, but it was nothing compared to the time some of the others had to do.
I was put to work in the kitchen. I served breakfast, lunch, and dinner. It was the absolute best thing, because oatmeal and chocolate-chip cookies equaled money. I had these baggy pants with big pockets that I would fill with the tasty delights. When medication time came, I would trade the cookies for the other patients’ meds. I got nearly everyone’s pills. In the ward they served nothing but downers. They didn’t want anybody getting all wired or hyper. So I was able to be sedated most of the time. Nothing was too powerful, but everything helped.
RELEASED
At last the day came when I was released back into the wild. I hadn’t been partying and I’d gained twenty pounds. Jamie picked me up with one of his girlfriends. We went straight to the Rainbow. I got pasta and did endless shots of Jägermeister. I got so sick, I puked my guts out. The Big Spit; it was great!
Now that I was back home I took every opportunity to go insane and party. Lindsay and I would score dope up to six times a day. Sometimes the coke would make me a little too anxious, so I took pills like Valium to keep the edge off. Smoking coke and heroin, and then shooting the two combined, became a favorite buzz. My relationship with Lindsay was based solely on partying. There was no real connection other than our insatiable appetite for substance abuse. We really went over the top, tweaking our brains out constantly. Within a week, I don’t think either one of us was in our right mind. I was in free fall, utterly insane. My little preemptive warning system had finally failed to go off, or I was too far gone to notice it.
FACE FRAPPé
When you’re as tweaked out as I was, it’s never a good idea to prep your own fix. One night, I messed up the dosage, then messed up my face. I was speedballing, injecting myself with heroin and coke. But in my shattered state, I must have injected myself with a horribly excessive amount. As soon as it hit my bloodstream, I collapsed on the floor of my bathroom. My body started going into convulsions, and what was worse was my head began slamming uncontrollably and repeatedly against the white tile floor.
It was the most horrifying experience of my life. Try as I might, even with all my strength, I could not stop my face from smashing down on the floor again and again. My lip split, my teeth cracked, and blood began to flow from everywhere. Still, I couldn’t stop. On the floor, a thick bath towel lay inches away from my head. If I had just been able to get it between me and the tiles, I may have been able to lessen the damage, but my body was so out of control, I couldn’t will myself to grab it.
Mercifully, the convulsions eventually ceased. I don’t know how long I lay there with teeth shards and bits of my face littering the bloodied floor. The next thing I recalled were the sounds of soft voices in quiet conversation, a brief moment of consciousness when I realized I was in a hospital room, and then more blackness. This seemed to go on for an eternity.
Finally, after several days, I was strong enough to sit up in bed and discuss my options with my mom and a plastic surgeon. There would be several reconstructive procedures, working in tandem with an oral surgeon. I was fortunate; the damage was reversible. The only thing that wasn’t reversible was me, because this was all I could think about throughout the conversation: “Now, if I could just score some dope.”
I think my mom saw the hunger in my eyes that day, just the way Steven Tyler had me pegged years before. As I pretended to pay attention to the surgeon’s strategy for putting me back together, she knew the truth was no one could ever put me back together. She knew I was hopeless. I was way beyond broken, and it was permanent. My need to escape that sad fact through drugs was so powerful that the only way out of addiction would be death itself.
SUICIDAL DESPERATION
When I got back home, my fellow train-wreck-in-waiting, Lindsay, was still prowling around the house. She hadn’t weathered my absence well and was even more strung out than before. When she wasn’t high she cried a lot and seemed extremely fragile emotionally. It didn’t take long before she bugged the shit out of me.
One evening I just couldn’t take it any longer and made the mistake of suggesting we part ways for a while. “Maybe you should go to your mom’s house,” I told her. She didn’t respond, only quietly retreated to the bathroom. I heard water running in the bathtub, then I must have dozed off.
When I woke up the next morning, I called out for her but there was no response. I looked around the condo, but she wasn’t there. I called the front desk and the building security to see if they had seen her leave, but they hadn’t.
I was consumed with an odd,
uneasy feeling. Where the fuck did she go? I walked into my bedroom and froze in the doorway. I hadn’t noticed this at first, but there in front of me I saw sheets tied to the bedpost. The sheets were draped out the fifth-story window, fluttering in the wind. This was all I fucking needed. I walked over to the window, filled with fear. “Oh God, no.”
I looked out, and there she was, her body motionless, sprawled out hideously in the bushes below. She must have tried to hang herself, but the sheets didn’t hold. She was naked and I could see that her body was covered with multiple cuts, some of which I later learned were previously self-inflicted. Her head hung at an unnatural angle, her left arm twisted behind it. I ran to the phone and dialed 911.
As fate would have it, my mom just happened to be coming by that morning to check up on me. When she arrived, she saw teams of cops racing into the building. She told me that she never thought twice about whose condo the cops were rushing toward. She stayed with me through all the questioning. Fortunately, the cops found only a little pot and my bong in the apartment, which they basically ignored.
Lindsay survived, miraculously suffering only a broken collarbone. We got her into the hospital and made sure she had the best treatment possible. After she got out, I never heard from her again. I never really thought about whether this was good or bad. If I wasn’t that into a chick and she decided to move on, then that was good for both of us. Besides, when you’re doing coke and heroin, you really don’t have the ability to give a fuck about anyone else. Loved ones can be sick, injured, in the hospital, in jail, and you don’t go to see them, you don’t even give enough of a fuck to call them. It’s not that you’re selfish; it’s just that the thought never occurs to you. The drugs demand all your attention every waking moment, and then you nod out and wet yourself.
ONE OF MANY ODS
I myself escaped death while living in a house in Calabasas. I would meet my dealer at the Thrifty parking lot in Laurel Canyon. This one afternoon, I brought my dogs with me to get them out of the house. After scoring, I’d drive to a little side street down the block. Then I’d pull over and shoot up. This was a regular routine for me that had resulted in at least one disaster already. All I remember from that day is sitting there cooking the shit up in a spoon. I vaguely recall seeing two little kids playing ball across the street. After that, nothing.
Apparently I went into convulsions again. I was violently flopping around, rocking the truck, my forehead slamming into the horn while the dogs went crazy. The kids heard the commotion and got help. Paramedics arrived and had to break the window to get me out. Again, I awoke in the hospital, covered in charcoal. When you overdose, they pump your body full of charcoal. It comes out of your nose, your mouth, and your ass. You spit charcoal, you puke it.
Shortly after that, there was another incident where I nearly didn’t come out of it. I had recently been prescribed lithium. What they didn’t know was that I was allergic to the drug. The shit was fucking me up more than anything. It turned me into a zombie.
One night I had a strong craving for a Slurpee. I had plenty of money, but I couldn’t find any. I tried to get out the front door, but I couldn’t even turn the handle. Sluggishly, I picked up my drum stool and threw it through the window to get out. But when I hopped over the broken glass, I sliced my foot badly in the process.
THE SLURPEE INCIDENTS
Wearing only boxers, I made my way down the hill. I was craving sugar. I must have looked so scary, limping along the street in my underwear, bleeding. I entered a 7-Eleven store, where the cashier eyed me warily. I didn’t have any cash so I stole a Big Stick ice cream; it must have been obvious as hell.
So I’m walking back, boxers hanging off my ass, bleeding like a stuck pig, sucking on my Big Stick, when a cop car pulls up alongside me. I look at them with my zombie eyes and say, “I don’t feel so good. I think I’m sick. Can you take me back to my house?”
They eyed me up and down and said, “You’re on your own.”
They took off. The one fucking time I want to get in a cop car and they wouldn’t have me! There’s a lesson for you: if you don’t want the police to pick you up, beg for their help.
I made it back to the house, and it took me forever to open my sliding glass door. When I finally did, I stepped inside and tried to close the door but just said, “Fuck it,” and collapsed on the couch.
Two days later I went through this exact same routine. Wearing only boxers, I went to 7-Eleven for a Slurpee, only to discover again that I had no money. My old house, the one I sold to former MTV VJ Martha Quinn, was close, just up a big hill. So I made my way there and buzzed at the front door. Martha’s husband was the greatest guy. He could have called the cops, but instead he just listened. I was a royal mess, swaying back and forth, slurring my speech. That lithium!
I said, “Please, I can’t find my money. Can I borrow $1.25 to get a Slurpee? Maybe you could take me down to the store?” So he drove me down to 7-Eleven, only to find that the goddamn Slurpee machine was broken. That kind of sums up my luck and my life. Even with help, the deck is always stacked against me.
Chapter 20
How Low Can I Go?
MINOR MIRACLE TIME
I have no idea why, but two days later one of my lawyers called my buddy Steve Sprite and asked him to check up on me. Over the years, Steve had proven himself over and over to be my absolute best friend, and he’s always there when I need him. He’s been by my side for years, and I don’t know how I’d manage without him. Maybe it was the lithium, maybe something else, but for some reason, I hadn’t been able to eat for days. I was just miserably sick from an ulcer or something. I’d get incredibly hungry and order up a ton of food from Jerry’s Deli—soup, sandwiches, knishes, mashed potatoes and gravy. Then I’d take one bite and get a horrid feeling in my stomach, reminding me that nothing would stay down.
I called a friend of mine, a woman who tended bar at a barbecue restaurant nearby. She swung by from time to time and helped take care of me. She and Steve took one look at me and were freaked out by the terrible condition I was in. Steve dragged me to his truck, a big piece-of-shit white Chevy that only he could get to start. I was so fucked up, I believed I was riding in a brand-new truck: I remember telling him, “When did you get this new truck? It’s like yours, only nice.” I thought it was so styling, a beautiful brand-new pickup, so I must have been delusional.
Steve got me to the emergency room of Century City Hospital and put me in a wheelchair. I remember being pushed through the doors. I kept repeating, “I didn’t do any heroin, I didn’t do any heroin.” I was completely out of my mind. I was put on a hospital bed, where I just stared up at the light. Steve was worried that I might be in a lot of pain and told the doctor. The doctor calmly walked over to me and yanked the hairs on my chest to prove I didn’t need anesthesia. He knew what he was doing, because I didn’t even flinch. I had a large infected lump on my arm, the result of my being completely abusive with a dirty needle. The doctor cut into it with a scalpel, and all this green ooze came shooting out. The nurses had to move the person in the next bed to another room because it smelled so awful. Then something let go inside of me and I just went out. Later, doctors would determine that I had slipped into a coma.
At some point during the time I was out, I remember floating in a dream that was incredibly vivid. I saw myself lying on top of a giant turquoise phoenix in the middle of a desert, and to either side of me were giant turquoise stones shaped like the phoenix. My point of view shifted and I was now in the sky, looking down upon myself. A vision of a woman floated up to me from beneath the clouds. She was nude except for a small garment covering her midsection. Her hair fell all the way to the ground. But it wasn’t exactly hair, it was hair that morphed into feathers, and those feathers formed wings. She flew above me and reached out. I was lifted into her arms and I swear I never felt so safe, so secure. We were hovering high above the earth as she turned and smiled at me. We suddenly shot up into the sky, where the l
ight became blinding.
I don’t know how long I was out or how deeply I had slipped into a coma, I just know that I caught a break, the biggest break of my life. Hospital records show I was admitted on April 19, 1996, and sometime between then and April 22, when I walked out against their wishes, a miracle happened.
The blinding light caused my eyes to flutter open suddenly, but the fluorescent glare blinded me and I quickly shut them to stem the searing pain in the back of my head. I was groggy, but I could feel the needles and tubes leading in and out of my arms and thighs. I thought, “Fuck this.” I angrily started yanking them all out, but the machines around me set off warnings, urgently buzzing and ringing. Something was very wrong; parts of my body weren’t working properly and this intensified my rage. A nurse ran in and shouted at me to stop, but I just stared at her. I had no grasp of what I had just done, had no idea what was going on.
Later that evening, a doctor performed a series of tests on me and told my family, who had come to visit, I was in stable condition and recovering. He shook his head and quietly slid the clipboard back into the metal sleeve at the foot of my bed. I looked around the room at my family. Mom, Mel, and Jamie were there, and that was fine with me. My mother climbed into my bed to be next to me. She was crying, a steady quiet sobbing. I asked her why. She explained how the doctor feared that initially, before my tube-tearing fit, I wasn’t responding to their tests, and they determined that I could be trapped in a coma for the rest of my life. The doctor told her that even if I were to come out of it, I would not be able to use my right side. She kept shaking her head, crying, going on about how it was a miracle, how amazing it was that I was responsive and, according to their latest tests, almost fully recovered. I didn’t come out of it, however, completely unscathed. I lost some control of the muscles on the right side of my face, and to this day I talk with a slight slur.